Within Arm's Reach
by misspatchesmom
Summary: Tony tries to deal with a long string of frustrating days at work, plus he and Ziva have a secret. One shot


Within Arm's Reach

Tony deals with a string of frustrating days at work

It was only 0930 and Tony already knew that the day would go on forever. What he wanted was a mere twelve feet away, but until the work day ended, it was out of his reach. After three weeks of being stuck on "go," the team was nearly worn out.

The day had started with a 0430 call out to a murder scene at the docks on the Anacostia. Two Naval Petty Officers had apparently walked into a fight between two women and one of the Petty Officers and one of the women wound up dead. The second Petty Officer was in the hospital in critical condition and the second woman had non-life threatening wounds. She refused to talk without an attorney.

All of the information they had so far was from the scene, the evidence they had collected, the bodies and the video surveillance from the dock. Tim had accessed the video at the scene, but so far that had been the ONLY thing that had gone in their favor.

To make matters worse, the MCRT had to deal with two FBI agents who had shown up, insisting they had jurisdiction because of the woman who died. Gibbs had called Fornell at 0530 and had chewed him out before even allowing Tobias a chance to wake up.

As the team documented the scene and gathered evidence, a young Metro PD kid, probably fresh out of the academy, had come to ask Gibbs if he needed anything other than Metro securing the perimeter. The kid had glanced at the bodies, and lost his stomach contents right in front of Gibbs and the team.

The fourth member of the MCRT had been relegated to desk duty for medical reasons. Even though Tony knew why she was on desk duty, it didn't make things any easier that his partner could not be with him in the field. In fact, that added to his frustration.

The team processed the information they had gathered, followed leads, dug deeper into the lives of the four individuals, and felt as though they were getting nowhere in a hurry. All four had come up clean, not even a parking ticket, and nothing unusual in their financial records, phone records, work history, and so on. ' _Yadda, yadda, yadda…_ ' Tony thought to himself, making sure he did NOT voice his boredom and frustration out loud.

At 1120, his partner stood up, glanced at him and headed in the direction of the restrooms. He waited two full minutes, which seemed to take forever to pass, and followed her. He arrived at the restrooms to see the cleaning carts blocking both doorways. ' _Well, shit_.' Tony wanted to scream.

He saw her exit the single stall handicap access restroom down the hall, and shrug. He rolled his eyes as she passed, and was about to say something when Gibbs appeared in the hallway. "MTAC, now." He motioned to both of his agents. They followed him up the stairs.

Director Vance, SecNav, Tobias Fornell, and Tim McGee were already in MTAC, waiting for the others.

SecNav got right to the point of the confidential meeting, "We have the potential for an international crisis here. Director Vance has already assured me that NCIS will work cooperatively with the FBI and Homeland Security to mitigate any negative blowback from this case. Now, before Fornell gets to his part, I want your acknowledgement that you are expected to cooperate. Understood?" He looked at each of the MCRT agents.

"Yes, sir." They responded together.

Fornell read them into the case. The two Petty Officers were bystanders as far as the main investigation, but whether or not there was a connection had yet to be investigated. The dead woman was an FBI undercover agent. The injured woman was a deep cover agent who had infiltrated an arms cartel that used the port for smuggling stolen weapons. Why the two had been arguing was still a mystery, as well as how and why the deaths occurred. The supposed link of the cartel to the Iranian government made the whole case a volatile hotbed. NCIS was to investigate the death and injury of the Navy officers, but that was all. Any information learned in that investigation would be shared with the other agencies. Likewise, any information learned that connected or pointed to the naval officers would be shared with NCIS.

Gibbs barked orders to his team: "DiNozzo, McGee, check out the Petty Officers' living quarters. Find out who knew them and talk to those people. Go."

"David, with me." Tony tried to make eye contact with Ziva, hoping for at least a chance to look into her eyes but Gibbs shooed them out of MTAC. ' _So much for the rest of the day_ ,' Tony thought and his frustration grew.

At 1845, Tony and Tim walked off the elevator after an exhausting afternoon in the field. They had visited the living quarters of both naval officers, talked to their CO and followed the dead officer's girlfriend through a shopping mall, until they finally managed to catch up to her in the parking lot. She denied even knowing the dead man, which immediately raised suspicion in Tony's book. Gibbs was at his desk, "What do you got?"

"Not a whole lot, Boss. Dead guy's girlfriend denied knowing him at all. She is hiding something." Tony had already started digging on the girlfriend.

"I have the two laptops, Boss. Going to check for anything we can use." Tim headed to Abby's lab with the laptops tucked under his arm.

Tony looked across the bullpen. His partner was not there; hopefully she had a chance to go home and rest. Gibbs saw Tony's look, and nodded. "Thanks, Boss." At least SHE got to get some rest, but she needed it and her medical reasons did not allow her to work more than ten hours consecutively. He was glad she had followed doctor's orders.

At 2230, Gibbs sent Tony and Tim home to catch some shut-eye. ' _Thank_ _God_ ,' Tony was beyond tired and maybe even beyond exhausted. He quietly entered the apartment, not wanting to wake his sleeping wife. He slipped out of his clothes and went to brush his teeth and wash his face. She stirred, but did not wake. Tony was just about to slip under the covers and put his arms around his sleeping ninja and hold her close, when his phone rang. He glanced at the caller ID and groaned: Gibbs.

"DiNozzo." He listened for a minute and started to get dressed again. "On it, Boss, ETA twenty minutes." There had been another murder of a Petty Officer and his remains were found in a warehouse near the docks. Tony scribbled a note to his wife, " _Call out to warehouse at the docks.1230. Love you, T_."

He tiptoed out of the bedroom and shut the front door as quietly as he could. He wiped his hand over his eyes as he drove. ' _Please let this be an easy one. I just want to go home._ '

The team processed the scene as usual, Ducky and Jimmy retrieved the body and by 0700, they were all at their desks working the newest scene. Tim had noticed some graffiti at the new scene that matched some that had been on the concrete near the bodies at the first murders. All of them believed the two murder scenes were connected.

Gibbs looked at his agents, "Go get more from the girlfriend, find out where she was last night. I'll get Ziva on the graffiti and finding where that leads." Tony and Tim grabbed their bags and headed to the elevator as Ziva stepped out. She smiled at Tim, "Good morning, Tim." He grunted a response. "Tony," Ziva brushed his hand on the sly as she passed; their first contact in four days. Oh, how he longed to just hold her in his arms even for a minute. He wanted to put his hands on her baby bump and feel the new life they had created stirring within his or her Ima.

"What are you waiting for DiNozzo? GO!" Gibbs voice carried over the dividers.

The first break in the case came when Tony noticed a tattoo that matched the graffiti on one of the dead petty officers' neighbors. Ziva had found a link to a gang by searching the tattoo databases. The gang had known ties to Iranian jihadists. Fornell arrived with more information about gang members.

After three days of tracking gang members known to have ties to the US, Homeland had stumbled on their DC operations base quite by accident. ATF was now involved because of the weapons, and the joint investigation was generating leads and intel as fast as the agents could process it.

When the raid on the operations base went down, Tony, Tim and Gibbs had been working with only short nap breaks for almost six days straight. Tony envied Ziva getting to go home each evening, but also missed her presence across from him on the nights at his desk. He wanted to be home with her.

The raid went down on a Thursday night around 2100. Twenty seven gang members were arrested, including the head of the DC operations (the girlfriend!); over five thousand weapons were seized as well as twenty kilos of cocaine, a pallet full of marijuana, three hundred thousand USD in cash and two computers.

By 2300 on Friday, everything had been processed, logged and shared. Two mid-level gang members flipped on the rest and the case was wrapped up. Gibbs sent his weary agents home, "Don't come back until Monday."

Tony grabbed his bag, and his suit jacket that looked as though he had slept in it (he had, multiple times over the past three days) and ran to the elevator. ' _HOME!_ ' was his only thought.

He opened the door to the apartment. He quietly closed and secured it, putting his weapon in his gun safe. He turned around to tiptoe into the bedroom and his ninja was right there. He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her. God he had missed her touch on him and touching her these past four weeks. It had been worse than being on assignment out of town having her across the bullpen from him and not being able to hold her. With their caseload the past month, he hadn't been home but a few hours each day.

"Zi, it's time we told the team that we are married. I can't take much more of not being able to touch you at work, or sneaking around. Plus, they need to know the baby is mine before he or she starts to talk and calls me 'Abba.'" He kissed her neck and then her mouth.

"Gibbs knows." Ziva looked at Tony. "He confronted me yesterday when you and Tim were going through evidence with the FBI agents. I could not lie to him."

"Oh, what did he say?" Tony wanted to know the reply as much as he dreaded it.

"To keep it out of the office and to love and cherish each other. He said he suspected that we were dating six months ago, but not that we were married." She was relieved that their secret was out. No more sneaking around, no more frustration, no more having to hide. Tony breathed a sigh of relief.

"Hold me, Zi. Just hold me. Let me touch you and touch me." He was glad they no longer had to hide their marriage, too.


End file.
